We are interested in the forces that hold together biological systems. For example the forces that hold together cancer cells in a tumor and the forces that bind drugs to a cell surface. The misfiring of these biological interactions can lead to,or be a result of disease. Thus the ultimate goal of our research is to inform the development of disease treatments based on knowledge of biological interactions. Work is highly interdisciplinary involving physics, engineering, biomedicine and chemistry.

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We are interested in the reductionist approach to biology which considers complex biological systems as machines allowing us to apply the laws of physics and rules of engineering to understand such systems. In particular we are working on building bio/machine hybrids bringing biological sensitivity and control to robotic devices. We are also interested in constructing artificial viruses for drug delivery (without the nasty infectious bits!!) and understanding/exploiting the ultimate bio/machine interface, the cell membrane. <br>

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Specifically we are looking at the following systems: <br>

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▪. '''Unfolding Disease One Molecule at a Time''' - '' Proteins involved in disease such as HIV, cancer and arthritis are potential therapeutic targets. Their unfolding and self assembly behaviour is examined at the single molecule level revealing insight into their function.'' <br>

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▪. '''Engineering Cells to Communicate with Electronics''' - '' Most attempts to interface living tissue with electronics involves finding novel approaches to building microelectronic probes. Our approach is to rebuild the biological systems so they can fit the electronics. This involves genetic engineering of cellular systems to enable them to produce a machine readable signal upon specified stimulation'' <br>

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[[Image:GIF-VIRUS-INFECTION NEW.gif|350px]]

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▪. '''Determining the Forces that Hold Cancer Cells Together'''- ''We examine the role of various proteins in metastasis and tumor growth'' <br>

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▪. '''Building Artificial Viruses'''- ''The virus particles infection strategy is ingenious. We would like to replicate this in synthetic particles for the delivery of drugs to targeted cells'' <br>

▪. '''Exploring the Surface of Cancer Cells''' - ''The cancer cell surface contains a myriad of potential targets for drugs. In this work we map interactions at the cell surface including both nano particle/cell and drug/cell interactions.'' <br>

▪. ''' Building Model Cell Membranesl''' - ''The cell membrane is the ultimate signal transduction interface where external signals are passed through to genetic control in the innards of the cell. We are building model membranes out of biological components in order to better understand the structure/function relationship of the cell membrane.'' <br>

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We work at the interface between chemistry, biology and physics and employ both experimental and theoretical approaches. If you are interested in studying challenging systems involving complexity and are not afraid of inter-disciplinary work please don’t hesitate to contact me.

We work at the interface between chemistry, biology and physics and employ both experimental and theoretical approaches. If you are interested in studying challenging systems involving complexity and are not afraid of inter-disciplinary work please don’t hesitate to contact me.

Current revision

Welcome by P.I. Daniel Frankel

We are interested in the reductionist approach to biology which considers complex biological systems as machines allowing us to apply the laws of physics and rules of engineering to understand such systems. In particular we are working on building bio/machine hybrids bringing biological sensitivity and control to robotic devices. We are also interested in constructing artificial viruses for drug delivery (without the nasty infectious bits!!) and understanding/exploiting the ultimate bio/machine interface, the cell membrane.

▪. Engineering Cells to Communicate with Electronics - Most attempts to interface living tissue with electronics involves finding novel approaches to building microelectronic probes. Our approach is to rebuild the biological systems so they can fit the electronics. This involves genetic engineering of cellular systems to enable them to produce a machine readable signal upon specified stimulation

▪. Building Artificial Viruses- The virus particles infection strategy is ingenious. We would like to replicate this in synthetic particles for the delivery of drugs to targeted cells

▪. Building an Artificial Cell - A bottom up approach to assembling an artificial cell.

▪. Cyberplasm - Building a swimmming bio hybrid microrobot

▪. Building Model Cell Membranesl - The cell membrane is the ultimate signal transduction interface where external signals are passed through to genetic control in the innards of the cell. We are building model membranes out of biological components in order to better understand the structure/function relationship of the cell membrane.

We work at the interface between chemistry, biology and physics and employ both experimental and theoretical approaches. If you are interested in studying challenging systems involving complexity and are not afraid of inter-disciplinary work please don’t hesitate to contact me.
Dr. Daniel Frankel : d.j.frankel@newcastle.ac.uk

LATEST NEWS !!

Welcome to the lab to new PhD student Hani Sallam. He received his Meng in Chemical Engineering from Newcastle and will be working on a project to interface
living tissue with robots

PhD opportunities

1) Interfacing biological tissue with machines
2) Mimicking the cell membrane to interface biological systems with electronics
3) Building a living exoskeleton

HIV paper makes front cover of Soft Matter:

Biorobot paper accepted!!

4 new papers in print related to protein unfolding

Welcome to the Lab to new PhD student Ana from Ecuador.

Cyberplasm receives media attention, here is the original press release living microrobot

Congratulations to Orr Yarkoni for passing his PhD viva for a thesis entitled "Engineering an inducible NO pathway to facilitate cell-electronics communication"

Congratulations to Darman Nordin for passing his PhD viva for a thesis entitled "Interaction of the extracellular matrix protein fibronectin with model cell membranes"